Important Patristic Documents Now Available on Community Pricing

The Patrologia Latina, Graeca, Syriaca,and Orientalis represent some of the church’s most extensive, important primary-source documents. They contain the writings of the early and medieval Fathers and Doctors of the Church in Greek, Latin, Arabic, Armenian, Coptic, Ethiopic, Georgian, Slavonic, and Syriac. These texts are invaluable for anyone interested in patristics, church history, historical and systematic theology, textual criticism, or original-language study. In fact, the Patrologia Latina and Graeca served as the translation base for Philip Schaff’sEarly Church Fathers and have been the bedrock for theological and historical studies of the Church Fathers.

The Patrologiae Cursus Completus: Series Latina (Patrologia Latinafor short), roughly translated “Complete Course on Patrology, Latin Series,” was published by Jacques Paul Migne between 1844 and 1864. The 221 volumes and approximately 150,000 pages that compose this important collection contain the writings of the Latin Fathers from Turtullian (in AD 200) to Pope Innocent III in (AD 1216). Each volume of the Patrologia Latina contains not only Latin editions, but also lengthy dissertations, introductions, critical apparatuses, and other supplementary material written in Latin. With the Patrologia Latina, you can research valuable but difficult-to-find works, like Radbertus’ and Ratramnus’ ninth-century writings on the Eucharist, which contain the earliest debate on transubstantiation and provide a window into the doctrine’s emergence and development.

The Patrologiae Cursus Completus: Series Graeca (Patrologia Graecafor short), roughly translated “Complete Course on Patrology, Greek Series,” was published by Jacques Paul Migne between 1857 and 1866. These 167 volumes and 110,000-plus pages contain the writings of the Greek Fathers from the late first or early second century to the fifteenth century. Many editions also contain notes on textual variants found among other manuscripts, along with explanatory material written in Latin. In addition to the 161 volumes of the PG (166 print volumes), the Logos edition also includes the later published index to the PG compiled by Ferdinandus Cavallera. With it, you can find entries by author, work, date, or subject. For those wanting to read important but obscure texts in their original languages, the Patrologia Graeca is a must. For example, you can read the Cappadocian Fathers, whose works were so important for formulating the doctrine of the Trinity against Sabellianism and tritheism.

These collections are not facsimile editions of page scans; they are full-blown, full-text Logos resources. Search, for example, for every occurrence of the word “filioque” to trace the important debate surrounding the procession of the Holy Spirit from the Son—a conflict that contributed to the Great Schism of 1054 between the Eastern and Western Churches. Search for “facienti quod en se est” to look for discussions on Franciscan pactum theology, which was so important for the controversies surrounding the Reformation era. Search for “θεοτοκος” or “ομοουσιος” to trace the important debates surrounding the deity of Christ.

Thank you for the question. Yes, all the Greek texts in the series Graeca have the Latin translations supplied by Migne. So, if you were to search for a Greek word or phrase in the resource, the Latin translation would also be available on facing pages.

In response to Mr. Catterton’s comment – while it is true that the ante-Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers are slightly more up-to-date than these series, Mignes’ series contain significantly more works than in Schaff’s editions. Furthermore, not only are many works missing in Schaff that are contained in these sets such as Epiphanius’ De Fide, (also called Panarion in the Frank Williams edition), but there are missing chapters in some of the writings in Schaff (e.g. there are actually more than 40 chapters of De Decretis by Athanasius and included in Schaff’s omissions is an important invective letter by Constantine the Great against Arius in De Decretis 42). I am so thrilled about this. I had access to online versions of Migne some years ago through my university when I was doing my doctorate, but this is the first time it has been at a price that could be purchased by individual scholars. Also, the company that did them before scanned the pages and there were a number of errors, so having them in the Logos format will be great. I can’t wait.